Vintage Kevin De Bruyne Does His Talking On The Pitch For Napoli

Antonio Conte didn’t mince his words when asked about Kevin De Bruyne after Napoli lost to AC Milan on Sunday night at the San Siro.

The Belgian brought the Partenopei back into the game as he converted a penalty on the hour mark, but was substituted 10 minutes later with his team chasing an equaliser.

De Bruyne, who joined the Serie A champions as a free agent from Manchester City in the summer, could barely conceal his disappointment as he walked off the pitch.

“I hope he was upset about the result,” Conte said.

“Because if he was upset for some other reason, he’s picked on the wrong person.”

Goals from Alexis Saelemaekers and Christian Pulisic secured a 2-1 victory for the Rossoneri, who joined the reigning champions at the top of Serie A with 12 points after five games.

Milan have now won four games in a row and have a better goal difference than the Azzurri and Roma, who are also level on points with the duo.

Napoli’s perfect start to their title defence may have come to an end, but it was the dynamic between Conte and De Bruyne that dominated the headlines in the aftermath.

And if the former studiously avoided any mention of the latter in the lead up to Napoli’s Champions League clash against Sporting Club, De Bruyne did his talking on the pitch on Wednesday night.

The Belgian set up Rasmus Hojlund’s opener with a beautiful through ball, allowing the Denmark international to finish with aplomb past Sporting goalkeeper Rui Silva.

Luis Suarez then converted a penalty to draw Sporting level, before the two combined again with 11 minutes left, De Bruyne lofting an inch-perfect cross for Hojlund to head in the winner.

The Belgian, who won the Champions League with Manchester City in 2023, had gone eight games without an assist in the competition.

On Wednesday night he had two.

Kevin De Bruyne rolls back the years in Napoli win

This was vintage De Bruyne, pulling the strings in midfield and splitting Sporting’s defence wide open almost at will.

There was a perfectly weighted pass here, a nonchalantly brilliant cross there and a reminder that while the legs may have slowed down, his footballing brain remains as quick as ever.

Napoli’s opener was a case in point, De Bruyne exchanging passes with Andre-Frank Zambo Anguissa at the edge of his own box, before accelerating past two players and playing a perfect slide rule pass for Hojlund.

This was a reminder of why Conte wanted to sign a player who scored 108 goals and registered 177 assists in 422 appearances for Manchester City in all competitions.

It was also an important win for Napoli, who had lost their Champions League opener against City two weeks ago, on a night when De Bruyne’s glorious homecoming fell flat.

The Belgian won 16 major trophies in a decade in Manchester, but was substituted 20 minutes into the game after Giovanni Di Lorenzo’s red card left Napoli playing with 10 men.

Significantly, on his return to the Etihad Stadium, De Bruyne took Conte’s decision to hook him out of the game on the chin.

But there was no such magnanimity on Sunday and, never one for diplomacy, the Napoli manager was eager to remind his star player who calls the shots in Naples.

“Every player must commit to serving the team with the right focus,” Conte said at full-time on Wednesday.

“That commitment, combined with our quality, is what allows us to raise the bar.

“I have no complaints about him [De Bruyne] personally – he is serious and puts in the effort. I know everyone wants minutes, but it’s my job to make tactical changes, and I do so because I want to win.

“Ultimately, in the eyes of the media, substitutions are either successes or mistakes. But what truly matters is that the whole squad must work in unison in both the offensive and defensive phases, with absolutely no exceptions.”

And if Conte was reluctant to laud De Bruyne, who has scored three goals in five Serie A appearances, Hojlund was only too happy to praise him.

“Playing with an exceptional talent like Kevin de Bruyne is special,” he said.

“I just need to get into space and he’ll get me the ball.”

Rasmus Hojlund’s Napoli resurgence continues

The Denmark international has hit the ground running since arriving on loan from Manchester United in the summer.

Hojlund scored on his Napoli debut against Fiorentina and looks a complete different player from the one who toiled in the Premier League for the past two seasons.

The 22-year-old scored 26 goals in 95 games for United, but he never lived up to the £72m ($97m) price tag United paid Serie A side Atalanta in August 2023.

Hojlund managed only four Premier League goals last season, a meagre return albeit perhaps one not entirely surprising considering scored just 10 goals in 34 games in all competitions in his only season in Italy before moving to the Premier League.

The Dane has already found the net three times in five games for Napoli, who have an obligation to buy him for £38m ($51.4m) in the summer should they qualify for the Champions League.

“It was the night you dream of, playing in the Champions League,” Hojlund told said after the game.

“I celebrated touching the Napoli badge because I’m happy to play here and the Champions League badge because I love to score in Europe.”

And there could be far more to come from him, according to De Bruyne.

“Rasmus has a lot of quality and as a striker when you go forward you need that smell of goals – it’s really important for him and the team,” he said in his press conference.

“It’s a great night for him and it’s going to help us get more goals with him.”

Over the past 14 years, Conte has won six league titles across Italy and England with Juventus, Inter Milan, Napoli and Chelsea.

And yet, he’s struggled to translate his domestic dominance into European success, with his best result coming in 2013 when he took Juventus to the quarter-finals of the Champions League.

Like Conte, Napoli have never made it past the Champions League quarter-finals, a record both are desperate to improve this season.